Jie (Jack) Yang
SMART Infrastructure Facility

Diverse partnerships, a passion for data, and game changing technologies

Data is everywhere, accumulating across every facet of our existence, and Dr Jie (Jack) Yang wants to use it to make the world a better place. By providing cutting-edge big-data computing capability to support decision making, Dr Yang collaborates with cross-discipline academia, industrial stakeholders, and government bodies to solve real-world problems in an ever growing data-driven landscape.

From collecting and analysing user generated content from social media to understand consumer sentiment across cultures, to developing complex simulations to guide transport and urban planning models, his research outputs have helped him to establish an impressive reputation across multiple industries.

One particular focus of his research is to bring together different aspects of computing methodology, such as deep learning, clustering, and evolutionary computation for massive data processing. Used independently or in combination with others, this research helps to provide better prediction accuracy and cost-effective outcomes for industry, government and the community.

For example, as the technical lead of an Australian Research Council (ARC) Linkage Project, Dr Yang undertook investigation work on a cutting-edge platform for online student behaviour modelling. The platform is used to collect student online activity from more than 25,000 smart devices across Australia, and processes thousands of pieces of streaming data in real time. The resulting analysis is used in domestic and international education policy development.

In an ARC Discovery Project, Dr Yang is part of a multidisciplinary team striving to disrupt the Australian media industry. By encouraging creatives to be more innovative and connecting them to global trends identified in part through digital research tools and data collection and analysis, his team wants to ensure Australia isn’t left behind when it comes to content creation.

Outside of academia, Dr Yang’s partnership with industry and consultation work within the field of machine learning has won him two industrial patents. By exploring the challenges associated with big data processing from a research-led perspective, Dr Yang and his collaborators will continue to pursue developing advanced machine learning technologies that are of benefit to society.